Detailed briefing covering the scope, eligibility and application process for the Audience of the Future Demonstrator Competition Briefing.

1. Audience of the Future
Demonstrator Competition Briefing
#AudienceFuture
#IndustrialStrategy
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10.00-10.30 Overview and Context
• Industrial Strategy
• Audience of the Future
• Demonstrator Programme Rationale
Andrew Chitty, Interim Challenge Director, Audience of the Future
10.30-11.00 Demonstrator Competition Scope and Process:
• Requirements
• Themes
• Application process
• Timelines
Matt Sansam, Innovation Lead, Innovate UK
11.00-11.30 Q&A - What support do you need?
11.30-12.30 Networking
Demonstrator Briefing Session

3. Overview and Context
Prof Andrew Chitty
Interim Challenge Director
Audience of the Future
UK Research and Innovation
#AudienceFuture
#IndustrialStrategy
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5. What is it?
• Support for key sectors to transform or to emerge and grow
• Extremely focussed on achieving well defined objectives that tackle a
societal challenge
• A focus on productivity and new skilled jobs
What isn’t it?
• A generic R&D fund
Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund

11. “Immersive experiences are new forms of content, new narrative
mechanisms and a new language around production which spans the
Creative Industries…..
“The best technology will not produce the step change needed
without equal excellence in content production and understanding of
immersion as a narrative form.
“The UK must ensure it is the most highly skilled nation producing
content that exploits these technologies”
Sir Peter Bazalgette Independent Review of the Creative Industries

13. Audience of the Future
To capture new global audiences and grow our leading market position
in creative content, products and services by adopting, exploiting and
developing immersive technologies.
Challenge Statement
*

14. That by 2025 UK is a global market leader in the creative immersive sector.
1. UK creates 10% of global creative immersive content
2. The UK Creative Industries sustains its above average growth.
3. The UK has a low barrier of entry for producing high-quality immersive content,
4. The UK has an increased skilled workforce to create immersive content.
5. Increased private investment in immersive technology and experiences
Programme Objectives
*

15. The next wave of the Challenge Fund
Data to early diagnosis
& precision medicine
Healthy ageing
Next generation
services
Audience of the future Quantum technology
Transforming
construction
Transforming food
production
Energy revolution

16. Audience of the future / Next generation services (pioneer) / Quantum technology (pioneer)
Artificial intelligence and data economy
Clean growth
Energy revolution
Transforming
construction
Transforming
food production
Healthy ageing
Medicines manufacturing
Data to early diagnosis and
precision medicine
Healthy ageing
Future of mobility
Faraday battery challenge
Extreme robotics
National space test facility
Industrial Strategy Grand Challenges

18. • Immersive technologies (AR, VR, XR) are the most significant and
potentially disruptive technologies to impact the Creative Industries
since the web in the mid 90s
• They present both opportunities and threats to the UK’s current level
of global competitiveness as both IP creator and production centre
• Global commercial opportunity for UK Creative Industries is through
content/experiences enabled by immersive technology rather than
platform or hardware
Rationale

19. • Audience of the Future is central to Creative Industries Sector Deal
• High expectations that AoTF will de-risk investment
• Identifying/ testing viable audience propositions & business models
• Innovation in production tools/reskilling workforce
• Industry engagement across the value chain
• Specialists in AR/VR/XR companies but also…
• Content studios, IP owners, creative technology companies, hardware
providers, platforms operators, investment community, distributors
Industry Context

20. Audience of the Future – £33m grant funding
• Ambitious, pre-commercial
content innovations using
global IP.
• New experiences that advance
the state of the art and test with
real audiences at scale.
• Large collaborations across the
supply chain to explore future
commercial models.
• Talent development and
experimental production
for the Screen Industries
• Delivered with Clusters
Programme
• Designing for future audiences £2m
• Making content production cheaper,
faster, more accessible £8m
• Investment Acceleration £2m
£16m Demonstrator
Programme
£12m CR&D
Programme
£5m Industry Centre of Excellence

21. £m 2018/19 2019/20 2020/21 Total
ISCF Funding 4.50 14.00 14.50 33.00
Matched Industry
Funding
1.70 8.10 9.70 19.50
CICP Funding 0.75 1.25 1.25 3.25
Total (£m) 6.95 23.35 25.45 55.75
Audience of the Future – a £56m programme

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Demonstrator Programme: rationale
• That UK Creative Industries future success in Immersive economy will be
based on our strength in innovation in content, experience and business not
in technology
• That investment in AR/VR/MR/XR at scale is currently held back by lack of
clear audience propositions, forms and formats that could underpin
commercial models and unlock required investment
• The current market is largely pre-commercial, with much current work
innovation driven, small scale, promotional or ancillary rather than seeking
revenue generating opportunities from new audiences.
• Public investment in a series of large scale, pre-commercial, collaborative
experience demonstrators could stimulate content innovation, audience
testing and business modelling at scale, provide sectoral learning and
unlock investment.

25. © Royal Shakespeare Company

37. • Up to £16m; 4 projects
• 4 areas identified with industry as maximum opportunity
• Performance
• Moving Image
• Sport Entertainment
• Visitor Experience
• Looking for projects that can significantly advance creative,
technology and commercial state of the art across a whole sector
Demonstrator Programme: overview

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Demonstrator Programme: Objectives
• Innovation: we will support industry led consortia to develop NEW
audience experiences that show they can significantly advance the current
state of the art
• Insight: each large scale demonstrator must reach an audience of
>100,000 in order to learn lessons at scale
• Capacity building/knowledge sharing: each consortium should have
sufficient reach to advance knowledge across their sector and a plan for how
to do that

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What do we mean by a demonstrator?
• Significantly advance the current state of the art
• Creative proposition
• Audience Proposition
• Commercial Proposition
• Technical implementation
• Reach >100,000 users across the lifetime of the project
• One or more audience propositions or tests
• Gather audience data
• Derive commercial insight
• Use globally recognised IP
• To reach audience
• To address rights and IP issues
• To inform commercial models

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Ambition and Scale
“Each one of these demonstrators would be the biggest creative
VR project in the world”
• This is a very ambitious programme
• But absolutely NOT just a VR one
• If at >1 of these projects does not significantly develop the case for AR/MR/XR at scale we
will have failed
• Looking for gamechangers
• not just the next thing (a bit bigger)
• The scale of funding available is beyond current experience
• Must address this – in thinking, in project scope, production, scale of experience, talent etc.
• We will be vigilant about over budgeting e.g. rights

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Consortia
• To meet the ambition you will need partners from across the value chain
• to access cutting edge research and innovation
• To access and work with globally recognised IP or cultural brands
• To create the experience
• To engage the audeinces, present and test the experience
• to advance knowledge across the sector
• We would expect to see the whole value chain engaged:
• Specialist XR companies but also academic and industry R&D teams, IP
owners, rights holders, cultural institutions/governing bodies, content
and experience producers, talent, hardware, technology platform and
distribution partners

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Challenges
• Scale
• Risk
• IP
• Match funding
• Sectoral impact
• Ambition
• Project Design
• Consortium Structure
• Budgeting
• Public Visibility

43. Competition Briefing
Tom Fiddian
Innovation Lead
Innovate UK
#AudienceFuture
#IndustrialStrategy
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44. • Innovate UK, as part of UK Research and Innovation,
will invest up to £16 million in 4 large scale creative industries demonstrator
projects through the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF). This is part
of the Audience of the Future (AotF) programme.
Summary

45. Demonstrators?
Internet of Things Cities
Demonstrator:
https://cityverve.org.uk

46. You’ll need to be:
• in scope for the competition
• eligible for funding
As well as, writing and presenting a game-changing application in a highly
competitive process.
Recipe for success

47. Your project must demonstrate it can significantly advance the current state of
the art in its chosen field. It must reach demanding audience targets, deal with
current and future rights issues, and avoid excessive audience acquisition costs.
To do this your proposal must include access to or use of globally recognised IP,
or partnership with a rights holder or cultural brand.
Scope

48. Your demonstrator must also:
• develop new immersive experiences at a large scale, achieving a public
audience across the project of more than 100,000
• demonstrate a high level of ambition, innovation and scale, with the goal of
transforming the sector
• bring together creativity, technology, human-centred design and data analysis
in order to innovate creatively and technologically
• generate audience, consumer and user insights that can be used to test the
viability of new revenue streams and business models
• demonstrate scalability and the potential to be exploited and replicated across
the creative, cultural, live events and entertainment industries
Scope

49. • Immersive Experiences: multisensory narrative or interactive
audience experiences mediated through technologies including:
• virtual, mixed and augmented reality (VR, AR, MR)
• haptics
• advanced visualisation
• other sensory interfaces
Scope: definitions

50. • The Creative Industries: the 9 sectors as defined by the DCMS/HMGovernment
• Advertising and marketing
• Architecture
• Crafts
• Design: product, graphic and fashion design
• Film, TV, video, radio and photography
• IT, Software and services (including computer games)
• Publishing
• Museums, galleries and libraries
• Music, performing and visual arts
Scope: definitions

51. This competition is the flagship for the ISCF Audience of the Future programme.
We have identified 4 themes with significant disruptive, creative and commercial
opportunities to grow new audiences through immersive technologies. This will
help grow the UK’s creative industries.
Scope: Themes

52. Moving image
• We are particularly looking for immersive audience experiences that use
moving image expertise to create new audience propositions with mass
market and commercial potential.

53. • We particularly encourage proposals
• That apply immersive technologies to new audience propositions in sports where
remote audiences are (or could) be significant drivers of value.
• Where events, rights positions and creative opportunities afford significant
opportunities to engage the public
Sports Entertainment

54. Visitor Experience
• We particularly encourage ambitious proposals and partnerships with reach
across the sector.

55. Performance
• We particularly encourage proposals that:
• explore the application of immersive technologies to the production or
consumption of performance works (or both)
• are relevant across multiple disciplines and in a wide range of contexts,
including but not limited to conventional venues, festivals and site specific
works.

56. Given the emergent nature of the field we will consider applications that are not
confined to these 4 themes. This is providing you can show that your proposal
meets all the criteria for a demonstrator.
Other themes

57. • We will not fund projects through this competition that:
• do not deliver an audience user experience, such as authoring or production tools
• request substantial funding for non-UK based partners or sub-contractors
• exclusively focus on new generic technologies such as e-commerce, streaming or
social media
• are technologies and experiences not primarily intended for a consumer audience,
such as industrial or business-to-business solutions
Projects we won’t fund

58. • You can claim up to £4 million. We expect your project’s total costs to be
between £5 million and £10 million unless there are greater levels of
business contribution.
• Projects must start by November 1st 2018, and end by December 31st 2020.
• If your project’s total costs or duration fall outside our eligibility criteria,
contact us at least 10 days before the competition closes.
Eligibility: project size

59. • To be eligible for funding you must:
• be a UK-registered business
• carry out your project work in the UK
• intend to exploit the results in or from the UK
• work in collaboration with others (businesses, research base or third sector)
• Collaborations must include at least one SME
• Any one business may lead on one application and partner in a further 2
applications. If a business is not leading on an application it can be a
collaborator in any number of applications.
Eligibility: lead organisation

60. • Collaborative project partners can include:
• businesses
• universities
• non-profit research and technology organisations (RTOs)
• independent research organisations (IROs)
• cultural institutions
• Non-business partners cannot lead on an application but can collaborate on
any number of applications.
Eligibility: collaborators

61. • Funding is available for projects with total costs £5 million and over. This
total cost is the combination of the requested grant value and the applicant’s
contribution. The maximum grant you can claim is £4 million.
• Demonstrators are classed as industrial research, for which you could be
funded:
• up to 70% of your total project costs if you are a small or micro business
• up to 60% if you are a medium-sized business
• up to 50% if you are a large business
Funding:

62. Universities – 100% (80% of Full Economic Costs)
Other research organisations can claim 100% of their project costs
• They must be non-profit distributing and disseminate project results.
Public Sector Organisation or Charity - 100% of eligible costs
• Must be performing research activity & disseminate project results.
• Must ensure that the eligible costs do not include work / costs already
funded from other public sector bodies
Funding: research organisations

63. All the research organisations on your project combined cannot claim more than
30% of total eligible project costs. This is in any capacity, whether they are
contributing as collaborators or subcontractors. If your consortium contains more
than one research organisation, this maximum will be shared between them.
Funding: research organisations
Total costs
Business
RO

64. • £6m project: one large, one medium, one small businesses + one cultural
institute.
An example
Total Costs £6m
£2.4m
Large
£1.8m
Medium
£1.2m
CI
£600k
Small
£1.2m Grant
£1.2m Match
£1.2m Grant
£1.08m Grant
£420k Grant
£180k Match
50%
100%
60%
70%
Total Grant: £3.9m
£720k Match

65. There will be 2 stages within the competition: a written application followed by an
interview.
Notable Dates:
• 21st May – Competition Opens
• 1st August (noon) – Submission deadline
• 18th-19th Sept – Interviews
• 21st Sept – Successful interviewees notified
Application process

66. • Programme Management for AoTF and other ISCF challenges will be an enhancement
of normal Innovate UK Monitoring
• Consortia will benefit from advice and guidance of UK Research and Innovation
advisers to help you meet programme objectives and provide additional technical,
creative or commercial expertise.
• UK Research and Innovation have also commissioned Digital Catapult to undertake a
programme of activity to support the Demonstrator projects.
• The Catapult will facilitate collaboration and shared learning between Demonstrator
projects and support a wider programme of engagement across the Creative Industries
New for Audience of the Future …

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Good luck
Please get in touch if you have any questions.
Customer Support Services: 0300 321 4357 (Mon-Fri, 9am-5:30pm)
support@innovateuk.gov.uk

68. Questions?